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The first official figures for the crime category, published by the Office for National Statistics earlier this year, showed that there were 7.6million cases of fraud and computer misuse last year.

People using dating websites were cheated out of more than £33million last year by lonely-hearts con artists.

And in one of the most high-profile computer hacking cases this year, 160,000 customers of phone company Talk Talk had their details stolen by cyber criminals in an online attack last month.

Findings from the Norton Cybersecurity Insights Report, published today, revealed that concern about online crime is so widespread, nearly 90 percent worry about falling victim to cyber criminals and only one in ten feel they have control of their internet security.

Nearly half of Britons, 44 percent have been hit by cybercrime in their lifetime and one in five or 22 percent in the last year.

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One in five people were hit by ID theft, computer hacking or other online crimes in 2014

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People using dating websites were cheated out of more than £33million last year

We no longer need convincing of the risks, breaches and cybercrime have unfortunately become a fact of life

Nick Shaw of Norton

The average loss for each person was £134, giving an estimated total loss across the nation of £1.6bn.

One in six people have been hit by the rising crime of online extortion, where hackers use so-called ‘ransomware’ to take over computers and deletes files unless a ransom is paid.

And even after paying the extortionists, half of those still lost their documents and photos.

The report found that one in ten had their identity stolen and one in seven saw their financial details compromised after internet shopping.

The survey of more than 1,000 people in the UK found that 45 percent pointed the finger of blame for the cyber attacks at foreign governments such as Russia and China.

While one in ten think the primary culprits are teenage hackers doing it for fun.

Despite falling victim to cyber criminals, two in five do not bother changing their passwords.

Nick Shaw of Norton, part of Symantec, said: “We no longer need convincing of the risks, breaches and cybercrime have unfortunately become a fact of life.”

“Our findings demonstrate that recent headlines have rattled people’s trust in online activity, but the threat of cybercrime still hasn’t led to widespread adoption of simple protection measures that people should take to safeguard their information online,” he added.